


Try Again

by Anonymous



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Age Difference, Angst, Divorce, Everything Will Be Alright In The End, Feels, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Long-Haired Victor Nikiforov, M/M, Teenage Victor Nikiforov, Thirsty Victor Nikiforov, Trauma, Yakov Feltsman Is So Done, Yakov Feltsman Just Wants to Be a Good Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-17
Updated: 2018-04-17
Packaged: 2019-04-24 00:42:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14344353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Victor just wants to be loved.In which Victor has too much baggage to handle and Yakov stumbles in helping him with it.





	Try Again

**Author's Note:**

> SEE THE TAGS! Don't send me yer therapy bills. Honestly, it's not that bad though... But don't!

Victor was beautiful. Everyone told him so. Fans scrambling over the stands to exchange sweet nothings. The emcees always commenting on his appearance before he even toed the ice. Peter’s heady whispers against his ear, soft and then frantic.

_My little Russian doll._

He knew it himself. It’s why he kept his silver tresses long, the ends teasing at his hips. Why he never wore his glasses over ocean blue. He used eyeliner and gloss to accentuate his features, pulled on skin tight jeans and sported sheer crop tops that barely reached his midriff. He was beautiful like this. He was loved.

Mostly. Yakov was different. He didn’t crack under Victor’s perfectly crafted smiles. Didn’t linger with his eyes and touch or spend time with him after practices. Yakov seemed content just to scowl at him, barking instructions that Victor seldom followed— which often led to more barking. Sometimes Yakov invited him to spend the day with he and Lilia, taking him to the galleria or the ballet. Other times, he brought him food, using it as an excuse to gruffly chide him about his routines or his latest PR disaster over dinner. Victor tried to loiter, to stick around the condo long after Lilia went to bed. Yakov always made him go home.

All in all, Yakov treated Victor like the rest of his skaters. Like everyone else. But Victor wasn’t like everyone else. He was special. Yakov had been his coach for almost two years now. Why couldn’t he see that?

Victor decided that perhaps he wasn’t trying hard enough.

He began wearing his pants tighter, his crop tops shorter. He stretched out in the open, purposefully moaning into the motions. He caught Georgi gawking twice and snorted to himself. Keep dreaming.

Yakov, on the other hand, never spared him more than a second glance. What was he doing wrong?

He tried harder. During their galleria visits, he asked for ice creams and popsicles. He made sure Yakov saw him taking in every last drop. He draped himself around his coach and clung there, made his eyes big and his lips pouty as he breathed in Yakov’s vintage cologne. Peter had smelled like that too.

To his chagrin, the invitations ceased. Lilia stopped giving him trinkets and leered at him whenever she visited the rink. It was nothing he wasn’t used to. Tasha had done worse. Not that she could prove anything until the end. They were always so careful...

Yakov began strictly arriving at the rink just before coaching Victor and leaving immediately after. He'd failed again.

"Vitya", his late babushka often said when he was six and still wobbly on his skates. "God loves a trinity."

This time he sent Yakov a dick pic.

He promptly followed the image of him, sprawled naked over his silk duvet, with an apology email. _I meant to send it to someone else! I’m so sorry!_ he typed. _How's that, Yakov?_ he thought, a confident smile trailing over his lips.

Yakov’s bouts of anger rarely swayed him, but for the first time he felt real fear as the man yanked him by the collar the moment he entered the rink.

It reminded him of the times when Peter would take him like this, hard, fast and frenzied. He hadn’t meant anything by it. He just loved Victor that much. How could he help himself?

Yakov dragged him into a back office, slamming the door.

 _We’re alone_ , Victor thought, arousal and goosebumps rising. The thrill didn’t last long.

Yakov screamed at him for what felt like hours. For ‘acting out’ and ‘disrespecting Lilia’ and a score of other phrases that danced around the subject.

 _Do you want to fuck me or not?_ Victor wanted to ask, to silence all the protests on those thin, scowling lips. Wasn’t it just that simple?

Why don’t you want me?

Yakov brought up therapy again and Victor felt anger simmering in the pit of his stomach. Why did he think he was crazy for wanting to be loved? To be held and cared for? To be told he was special? Didn’t everyone want that?

“If you don’t like the picture just say so,” he smiled with a tilt of his head before exiting the office, hips swaying.

Yakov never said he didn’t like the picture.

Next, his coach threatened to invoke mandatory therapy visits and tell his parents if he didn’t stop. Victor toned it down because he didn’t want to see a shrink. He knew his parents wouldn’t respond. They were out of country, per usual, and they didn’t care what he did so long as he stood on the center podium at the end of the night.

Life went on and Victor accommodated it the best he could. Yakov continued to avoid him outside of coaching, not even eating lunch with him anymore, and Victor took solace in other places. In his admirers comments on his Myspace account and a blur of moments in secluded corners of the locker room showers. In junior gold medal after junior gold medal and all the free products top brand companies sent him to endorse.

Yakov bought him a puppy to congratulate him and it was sweet. A nice gesture. But it wasn’t enough. Wasn’t Peter, holding him close and whispering “My one, my only, my angel.” Wasn’t love.

The perfect opportunity presented itself that next year, Victor’s first in the adult ranks. Victor took gold at Europeans and celebrated for most of the night, chatting up sponsors at the banquet and drinking enough liquor to give him extra courage. He still kept a clear head as he walked the hotel corridors for Yakov’s room. He’d been thinking about this for the past month and he wasn’t about to let all his planning go to waste over too much wine.

Yakov and Lilia had separated just a little over a month ago. Not legally, but their marriage was as good as dead. Victor always thought they were too severe for one another. He wondered if their jobs kept them away too much… if Lilia had gotten too close to one of her chiseled ballet students over in Moscow… if Victor's picture had anything to do with it. He knew it shouldn’t, but the thought made the blood rush hot in his veins.

He stopped before the black wood door and knocked. “Coach Yakov!” he called. “I brought you some tea!”

A moment later, Yakov opened the door with the same tired eyes he’d been donning for the past few months. He still wore the white dress shirt and black slacks from the banquet, the blazer abandoned over the bed behind him. An opened wine bottle sat on the desk, one smudged glass beside it. He folded his arms taut over his chest and they bulged under the white material. Victor wondered how they would feel pressing him into the mattress, running hands down his body, his little doll. He bit his lip.

“You alright, coach?” He managed a perfectly innocent smile. He’d worn his most proper attire for the occasion— as proper as Victor’s casual attire got anyway— black leggings and an off the shoulder baggy green shirt that reached mid-thigh. Teasing, but certainly not enough to be refused at the door.

Yakov just grunted, eyes a bit dazed with fatigue and wine.

“Can I sit for a while?” he asked, happy when his voice didn’t waver.

Yakov considered him for a long moment and the anticipation curled and flipped in his gut.

“Come in,” Yakov finally said and Victor’s heart lurched as he led him into the hotel room, letting the door shut behind them.

Victor placed the teas upon the desk beside the wine bottle and plopped onto a leather armchair, eyes still on Yakov. Yakov sat on the sofa hunched over, hands clasped between his legs. There was silence.

Silence was important. That’s why Victor had asked to ‘sit’ and not to ‘talk’. Yakov didn’t like talking. He much preferred shouting or a series of grunts that Victor hadn’t quite deciphered in their nearly three years of working together. It didn’t matter though. He would crack tonight.

“First gold medal out of juniors.” Victor was surprised when Yakov spoke first. “How does it feel?”

“Good,” Victor nodded and it was true. The audience loved him. They had gone wild at his win, more than ever before. Sponsors clambered for him. Even his mother sent him a text. The world couldn’t get enough of Victor. Yakov didn’t seem so impressed.

“I couldn’t have done it without my coach," Victor beamed at him.

Yakov scoffed. “You say that now, but you never listen to me.”

“I don’t listen all the time,” Victor winked. “But I remember everything you say!”

It made him feel guilty to admit, but Yakov probably really was the best coach he’d ever had. His childhood coaches didn’t count and Peter was so easily distracted.

“Lilia said you were the one to watch,” Yakov said with a short laugh and Victor’s smile strained around the edges. He didn’t want to talk about Lilia.

“She coming back?” Victor asked, attempting to smooth the edges from his tone.

“No,” Yakov said, not even looking at him. He’d just won gold at Yakov wouldn’t even look at him. “It’s over.”

He was quiet after that, leaned over the sofa, head facing down. Victor stood, crossing the space between them. Yakov didn’t protest when he sat down beside him, nor when he molded himself against his side and rested his head on his shoulder. Yakov drew in a sharp breath as Victor's hand fell on his leg, massaging along the knee.

He never had to push this much with Peter. Barely had to try… Victor entranced Peter with the simplest of motions, by eating, walking or even just a look. And Peter loved him so much, he couldn’t help himself.

“Victor,” Yakov whispered, but whispering was all he did as Victor worked his way up his thigh, massaging deeper. He pressed himself further in, lips tickling at Yakov’s ear as he tossed his hair back.

“I’m so glad you’re my coach,” he breathed, his voice breaking into a whine at the end. He palmed into Yakov’s middle and found him rock hard. Yakov’s breath hitched and he didn’t push him away. An irrepressible grin slipped over Victor's lips.

“I knew you wanted me.” He straddled him, pressing his own hardening arousal, more obvious beneath the thin leggings, against Yakov’s. “Coach.” Peter loved it when he called him that. Judging from the sudden upward jerk of his hips, Yakov did too.

Yakov’s calloused fingers threaded through his hair, tugging him in to press their lips together in a heated kiss. Victor stretched his arms around his neck to deepen it and Yakov ran his hands up Victor’s legs, kneading his hips. They vanished beneath the baggy shirt to trail the line of his torso.

“Ahn!” Victor cried as rough fingers thumbed at his nipples.

“Is this what you wanted?” Yakov growled, still thrusting up against him, gruff and breathy.

“Yes coach!” Victor choked out, tears brimming his eyes as he rutted forward. He knew he could do it. He was made for it. For making people want him like this. Love him like this.

Yakov winced and froze with the next motion. He massaged at his lower back. “The bed.”

Victor complied, manuevering himself out of Yakov’s lap and into a standing position. He disposed of his shirt as he settled down on the cream cotton sheets, flinging it out of sight. He kicked at his leggings next, shimmying as they slid down his hips.

Yakov undid his pants overhead, breathing still heavy from dry humping him. Victor clutched the sheets, excitement coursing through him. How would Yakov want him? On his elbows, ass in the air? On his knees?  His back? Regardless, he was prepared, lube leaking out of him at the split. Peter always liked when he was ready.

The bed depressed under Yakov’s knees and Victor opened his legs before him, eyes sheeted with lust.

“Coach,” he breathed in that soft, unassuming tone men his age seemed to like so much. Especially Peter. Peter used to love him like this, spread out and waiting across the comforter, hair fanned out in angel wings around his form. He’d praise him for it. Tell him everything he ever wanted to hear.

 _Tell me I’m beautiful like this_ , he eyed Yakov in a silent plea as the man leaned over him with dilated pupils and clouded eyes.

  
“Victor…”

 _Tell me I’m good enough_. He stretched his arms out for him, blue eyes desperate and begging.

_Love me._

“Get up.”

The words fell harsh and clattered on his ears. A chill drifted over him, quaking his shoulders and raising his hairs for all the wrong reasons. He looked up to see Yakov stepping away from the bed, eyes firmly trained on the opposite wall.

This couldn’t happen. Not when he was so close.

He slid from the bed, nothing but his long tresses to curtain him as he made his way toward where Yakov stood, his back turned to him.

He slipped pressing fingers over his shoulders, lips dusting over the curve of his ear. “Co—”

“Stop it!” Yakov spun around, eyes raging, the usual scowl on his features. “Get back over there and put your fucking clothes on!”

They were back in the rink again, Yakov shouting and Victor implementing every third thing. Yakov’s shouting never got to him. But here, naked, vulnerable and thoroughly confused, his shoulders begin to tremble, his eyes glassing up. He turned away, not wanting Yakov to see him cry as he stalked back toward the abandoned pile of clothes on the carpet, a numb crushing in.

“I’m sorry,” he heard the rare quiet tone from over his shoulders as he pulled his leggings on, the leaking lube forming a wet spot at the crotch. When Victor didn’t say anything, Yakov tried again.

“Victor, you’re my student and…” There was a big, gruff sigh, followed by the sound of shoes padding across the carpet. “I care about you. I’m not using you to forget about Lilia. You’re just a kid.”

“I’m not a kid!” Victor whipped around, rage building in his chest. “I’m 16. Legally—”

“It’s not about that,” Yakov snapped, groaning as he ran one agitated hand over his balding head.

“I get it, Coach Feltsman,” Victor said, all attempts at his usual plastered grin and coyness abandoned, leaving nothing but cool eyes and a set mouth. “You don't have to pretend to like me just because I win for you.” Spite flickered through him and a joyless smile curved onto his lips. “Maybe I’ll go back to my old coach. He didn’t treat me like a child.”

Yakov scoffed. “We both know Peter’s too busy handling the allegations over in Germany to coach,” He spared him a short glance. “You know you weren’t the only one.”

It sliced into him like razored knife, gutting him out. He knew it. He’d read it. it didn't make it any easier to swallow, each time more harrowing than the last.

He was the only one that mattered. The other two were nothing. Peter hadn’t even dealt with the first for years before him and the other… His fists clenched, remembering his rink mate back in Moscow.

Yakov’s shadow fell over him, pulling his attention from how much it hurt.

 _We could fix it._ He lifted his tearfilled gaze to meet Yakov’s somber one. _I could be your only one._

He nearly gasped when Yakov reached out to take his cheeks in both hands, stilling his face.

“You are Victor Nikiforov, 16-year-old gold medalist and the most crazy, pig-headed, brilliant student I’ve ever had the misfortune of teaching,” he chided him, squeezing at his cheeks. “Don’t cry for that bastard.”

He ducked his head from Yakov’s hands so that he couldn’t see how his vision went abstract with tears, spilling over and dripping onto the carpet.

“Come here.” Yakov pulled him in and Victor did, his cheek resting in the crook of his neck. Yakov didn’t push him away when the tears seeped into his white dress shirt nor when Victor clung to him, quivering fingers pressing into his back. He took all of the whining, snot and tremors in stride, demanding nothing.

“Ah, Vitya,” Yakov sighed, pressing a kiss to his temple. The name and the motion brought a gentle familiarity to Victor, of a simpler time when wanting and love and good enough all swirled in her clear blue eyes and the scent of raspberry jam and honey bread. His eyelids shut, his body going limp against Yakov’s, and he let him. They swayed like that for a long while, the sound of the hotel HVAC, a soothing drone.

They parted only when Victor pulled away, eyes heavy with sleep. He helped Yakov dispose of their untouched teas and cork the wine bottle.  Afterwards, they paced the halls for his room. Yakov congratulated him one last time at the threshold, squeezing at his shoulder, and then he was gone. Victor checked his phone for Myspace email alerts and updates from his sitter on Makkachin before nodding off on the sofa, fingers still hovering over the keypad.

He didn’t try again.

**Author's Note:**

> I got this idea a while ago and it was kicking around in my head and starting to write itself without permission. I told it several times "No! YOI is my happy place! Go do this in another fandom!" But it really wanted to be written so...  
> I'm just glad to have it out of my head honestly.  
> Let me know your thoughts if you have them.  
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
